Steve Gray created this Elder Statesman blog for me. I'm not completely sure how to use it other than to express my opinions from time to time. I do find I have a lot of opinions.
I'd like to start by thanking Steve for providing me with the Elder Statesman tag. I've been trying for some time now to come up with an appropriate way to repay him. If anyone has any ideas you can provide them here, or send them to me off blog.
Here's my opinion for the day, taken from a discussion of what are the "Top Ten Technologies Directors Should Know About" a few of us had by email earlier today:
"I think video production and deployment is a technology that is leaving us (at least in Maine) behind. Some of our clients' kids are posting sophisticated video on YouTube while we in the legal aid tech community have a few isolated talking heads scattered around the country. All of us, Directors and techies, need to get up to speed."
For many subjects video is the best means of communicating information to our clients (and our staff). A demonstration is worth a thousand words, or pictures, or HotDocs interviews for many of the things they need to know.
A couple of years ago I got Gabe Hammond to put together a "producing video" training at NLADA or Equal Justice, but it just didn't take with me. I still need to figure out how I can more easily and quickly produce and stream short client-oriented videos.
I'll leave it at that for now, but as I write I can feel more opinions welling up and clamoring to get out.
Just in time....NTAP Training
NTAP is hosting a training this Friday, February 23rd to discuss use of multimedia content on statewide websites. We'll take a look at many of the video options that Gwen describes as well as various program's use of the webcast system. We'll also spend some time visiting the very question you Hugh raises regarding the advancements in online video posting and how we in legal services might take advantage of these technologies.
For more on the training and to register go to: http://www.lsntap.org/node/1851
There are really at least
There are really at least three types of video content that legal aid could use and they work for different things. Webcasting, which Illinois has used extensively (we have almost 300 videos in our advocate video library and 60 on the client site) is the easiest way to create video content and the webcast system will eventually be available on all statewide websites I believe. All that is required is a computer, a broadband connection, and an $80 webcam. These seem to work well for substantive law trainings where a talking head is enough (the current webcast system wasn't really designed for anything more than that; it could technically do that with some modification to the current application if i ever had enough time to play with it). We usually post supporting materials and related content along with the videos.
Then there is produced video which is more appropriate for things like court videos and demonstrations that require movement in the video. These are more expensive and time consuming to produce than webcasts, because they require the time and expertise to create scripts, cast, shoot, and edit the videos. We've done a few of these (one of which is online here) for our client site.
There is also technical demos that could be done with animated video. We have one on our client site that our Flash designer did, but Wink is a free tool that NTAP has looked at for creating technical demos. Wink combines screenshots, animation, and audio to create interactive demos that could be used to show people how to use web sites or web-based applications or how to do things like fill out forms.
Video Killed the Advocate Brochure
I think you're right that video is a preferred means of communication.
Our Georgia Clients Council is starting to use our Probono.net webcast module to add content to their site-- see this initial effort: http://www.georgiaadvocates.org/link.cfm?7281 . We hope to have the clients take our program legal brochures and read them or parts of them on camera. We also plan to use Spanish-speaking narrators. Lots of clients have reading issues, whether it's a literacy issue or vision difficulties, or they just prefer video as their learning method.
We're also using video to reach advocates and community groups, as in this statewide TANF Briefing: http://www.georgiaadvocates.org/link.cfm?7686 .
Probono.net is working to roll out the webcast module to its clients. It's a pretty straightforward, moderate-bandwidth approach, but it is pretty easy to use.
YouTube is an alternative example, but you can't narrow your audience, so it's not appropriate for all content.
Our new (younger lawyers) are very eager to use technology-- they demand it. And fortunately, my exec director "gets it" and encourages staff to think about alternative delivery methods based on tech.
I think it is important for top management to learn about new tools that are available and that are on the horizon, but I firmly believe that if we educate our new lawyers and other new advocates about what's out there for our programs to use, they will create a groundswell.
"Real lawyers use technology." Just my 2 cents...